On June 25, FYI issued a press release regarding their latest offering, a cooking showdown between the next generation of chefs and the current generation. A new culinary competition on the network will be pitting child prodigies against professional chefs in the new series Man vs Child: Chef Showdown. The purpose of the series is to bring together some of the most gifted young chefs in the world, with the same people that they have looked-up to and tried to emulate.

Man vs Child: Chef Showdown is being hosted by TV personality and chef, Adam Gertler. The show will also feature a number of guest judges, as well as recurring judges. Alia Zaine and Mike Isabella will act as both commentators and recurring judges on the show. Zaine is a private chef out of Los Angeles, while Isabella is a chef and restaurateur out of Washington D.C.. The guest judges will themselves be restaurateurs and executive chefs. Some of the guest judges include such individuals as Antonia Lofaso, Hubert Keller, Josiah Citrin, Mary Sue Milliken and Ludo Lefebvre, amongst others.

This new culinary competition, Man vs Child: Chef Showdown, will pit a team of child prodigies in the kitchen, against executive level chefs. In each of the episodes there will be a team of five young prodigies who take on a different professional chef and defend their abilities in a culinary setting. The child prodigies are 7-year-old Estie, 11-year-old Dylan, 13-year-old Cloyce, 12-year-old Emmalee and 14-year-old Holden.

As these children put their skills to the test against older, more experienced chefs, the question will be if their imagination and talent will be enough to prove that a generation brought up on cooking programs can take on master chefs. This battle for cooking supremacy will truly pit tomorrow’s food stars against some talented chefs in the industry today.

Every week the team of young culinary whiz-kids will take on a different executive chef. The overall cooking aptitude and expertise will be tested for each of the competitors. There will be three rounds of dynamic cooking as the chefs are challenged to develop different dishes under circumstances that would be considered unusual. In the first two rounds of competition, the judging panel will taste each of the dishes and decide who has created the most appetizing, inspired and delicious dish. In the final round, the judge is a master chef who is critically-acclaimed and who will do a blind taste test. Once a winner is determined overall for the three rounds, the winner gets the greatest prize of all, bragging rights.

Man vs Child: Chef Showdown is produced for FYI by Kinetic Content. The executive producers for the program for Kinetic Content are Paul Hogan, Kathleen Burns, Katie Griffin and Chris Coelen. The executive producers for FYI are Liz Fine and Gena McCarthy.

The new culinary competition pitting seasoned chefs against child prodigies, Man vs Child: Chef Showdown, is set to premiere on July 23 at 9 p.m. EST on the FYI network. There will be 14 episodes of the show with each of the episodes running for an hour.

I am REALLY getting tired that the kids win every time…..the judges are obviously enamored with the cute factor..even with the olden Holden. I have watched for months. What ended it for me was the show pitting child against the small, quirky truck chef (ep 11 or 12) …CREATIVITY, ADHERENCE TO THE SPIRIT OF THE CHALLENGE are the rules; this child produced a traditional, boring PRESENTATION and guess who won?????? I AM SO TIRED OF THIS SHOW!!!
Alos, why does the child present his plate FIRST every time??? The Judges must be affected by FIRST bite vs SECOND bite! It is psychologica!
UGH!!
I love kids, I teach kids, I want my own students to excel,,,BUT, I insist they play and win fair challenges, judged by smart, unaffected taste buds……

How dare you refer to a child with no formal training as “chef”! Top that off with two judges that have no idea what they’re doing or what they’re talking about? Really judge…”you never use cream in risotto”? You’re clueless…or do you have more on the ball than Emeril?